Talking to your baby helps with language development

By Liz DeCarlo

Senior Editor

Talking to your baby may be the best thing you can do to foster
language development, with one caveat-make sure your child is
talking back to you.

Whether it's just the baby sound of "ga" or a two-word sentence,
the interaction between child and adult is an important component
of children's language skills.

"It's not just language kids are learning, it's communication
and communication is a two-way street. The more practice they get,
the better they are," says Frederick Zimmerman, associate professor
at UCLA and lead researcher on a recent study about language
development.

The study of 275 families with children age 2 months to 2 years
showed that children with high language scores engaged in a lot of
conversation with adults. And in a new twist on language studies,
computer software was used to objectively assess the language of
both the children and the adults.

The results of the study show that the more language a child
hears, the better their language development. But the interactions
between the parents and the child are even more crucial.

Zimmerman suggests that when parents are talking to their baby,
they encourage the child to respond. "Parents intuitively know what
the right thing to do is, to have conversations with their child,
to interact with them," he says. "The main message is to avoid
taking too many shortcuts. We all get tired and there's definitely
a time when you feel like you're tapped out, but remember these
conversations are the foundation of the parent-child
relationship."